Jacksonville State Head Football Coach Jack Crowe
The Georgia Tech Press Conference
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"We're in the final preparations for our opener against Georgia Tech. I wish we had more time. I think time is going to make this football team better and better, but its time to play, and I think probably any coach would like to have more time. We've got a tremendous challenge for several reasons. The first challenge is us, just knowing ourselves well enough to do - coaching wise - the right things with the players we've got and another part if this is just our player uncertainty. You try to, in coaching, eliminate all the uncertainty you can, but sometimes your uncertainty is just in your teammates and the system because you've never been in a game with it. And we've got roughly half of our two-deep depth chart that's never been in a game here. So it's going to be for me. Take our quarterback. I've never been to a game with this guy. I know enough about football to know that game and practice are two different animals. Then you add this to it and I'm sure Paul (Johnson) will take the same approach and he could say the same thing. But, we've been watching Navy film and Arkansas film, so that tells you something right there when you get ready to play somebody, and we didn't have a film swap. They didn't ask for one and we didn't ask for one. You never want one in their offense because you're not watching what somebody does and I'm sure they had ways of getting film on us anyway. But to see their people in a new scheme really sort of redefines their people, too. Just a lot of new and a lot of uncertainty. I've been in these games on both sides of this issue, just up and down when you play up and down. The uncertainty is where you get people, from the upside of it.
"Traditionally, these games start off really good for one side, I mentioned Mississippi State. When we were over there two years ago, they returned a punt and returned an interception and its 14-3 at halftime. Both of those, I think, are an affect of speed of the game, environment, certainly things that affected the outcome. So a big challenge for us is handling the first five minutes of the game. Remember us playing Kansas? I think maybe it was the third game and they scored 21 points in about eight plays. And then, the game was a lot different after that. So, you know, these games have a tendency to have a really critical first five minutes because of all that uncertainty. But, Coach Johnson's never taken this team to the field either, so he could about say the same thing. I mean they are looking at an offense that's been retooled for a new quarterback and so on, so its gonna make a real interesting start to a football game. I don't think anybody will be able to sit in the stands and say “Well, anybody can call those plays. That's the same thing they've been doing.” Well, fans aren't gonna be bored. Everything they see will be the first time they've ever seen it. Both sides of the ball and on both sidelines.
"But, here is my assessments and that's all you can do is make assessments. I think that in their scheme and they had Adrian Peterson at Georgia Southern there was a phenomenal fullback in this offense. But I think in Jonathan Dwyer, they probably have a better player than they've ever had at that position. I have great respect for him. Some of our players tell me what a really special person and player he is. Some of our players know him. I don't know if they ever could have recruited Jonathan to play fullback in this offense, but he's probably perfect. You know, I see all kinds of problems because this is a fullback first offense and he is. I think you'd have to go back to (Earl) Campbell at Texas, to where you had such a great athlete running in such a similar situation because it was easy to see the way he finished the year last year. He was the next All-ACC right behind Tashad Choice. He was the next guy that was going to be the All-ACC runningback. So, that is a phenomenal issue for us, is him. And then you got a quarterback, quite honestly, that I think fits the thing to a tee. It's a fullback/quarterback offense and you've got Josh Nisbett, a guy that was recruited to play a lot of positions by a lot of people. And probably his best skill is what they ask him to do and that's when he plays with his legs and they've really ended up with a great fullback/quarterback. I don't know if somebody picked a coach with a system to fit the players, but they did. You have to give somebody credit for making this a pretty good pick because those both fit.
"In fact, I think they make them an enormous threat early on, to anybody they play. You add to that, that they probably have down the field receiving ability - to change over from a previous offense and it probably gives you a higher passing threat than by far just in the carry over from people that normally line up in this offense. And, it's hard to play the pass and play the option. I think - you can go back to Homer Rice who's from Georgia Tech and back to Joe Hamilton. There has been an option quarterback that you just better not avoid the middle or down the field because Ralph was there and he would play the option and kill you with the pass. So its part of a Georgia Tech tradition to have these kind of quarterbacks with a really great combination of option and pass together.
"I have a very much appreciation for Paul and what he's done at other places and I see an emerging offense that is going be very hard to handle for anybody. And you put us out there and I think we've got, maybe three starters returning on defense, maybe four, depending on if you want to call one that rotated a starter. We're very young and that's an enormous challenge for us. The real challenge is getting your offense the ball, because they can take the ball and keep the ball all day. So our defense is going to have to really show up and make plays because everybody wants to talk about offense and offensively we're transitioning also.
"We've made people say 'Are you going to change offenses for Ryan?' No, we didn't change offense for Ryan, but we certainly adjusted our offense for Ryan. And exactly what that is? Please don't ask questions. I mean, the scouting reports over the internet aren't very smart, but we certainly have what I think is a premiere thrower. So the protection of the quarterback and the ability at receiver is really going to define to what extent we can use that. Those are big questions to me, particularly, when you look at our front four. I have not said this so emphatically early on and I had a few people that understood more than I did to say 'There ain't no doubt.'
"There's no doubt in my mind when I say there may not be four better defensive linemen and probably isn't four better defensive linemen on one football team in America than they've got on the field at Georgia Tech. Now when you talk you half to protect your quarterback. We're starting some very young players and at one position we really don't know who our starter is against that kind of front. Not since the days of Miami have I heard that statement made. When Miami was just putting the front four out there, they were all headed to the next level. So that's an enormous challenge for us. I think we're going to have to do some things, not because it fits our people. We're going to have to do some things to match up against their people offensively. But, we see an opportunity to get off to a challenging start. I think, for the first time, we played one of these games first and I like that. I like it being our first game. I don't know what we would have done had this been number three or number four game. I don't think we could quite handle the newness of their offense had we not had the extra time.
"We've got some people that are going be game time decisions to play, and it doesn't go well for me to discuss them or their issues. But we're very excited about starting this season since it's the first game. I haven't been this excited to start a season with a football team and can see what this football team can become and this is the best we've had. Now whether it happens or not, like I told our players “We have talent but we don't have a team. We're becoming a team.” They have done everything that gets you from being a bunch of talented guys to being a team that I've asked them to do. But, the crucible of the game is the only way you really melt all that together to one heart and one mind. So, I've got to find out really just what kind of team concept we can develop before I just really get optimistic about the talent that I see, but I see talent. I see enough talent for us to meet our goals."
